One-year prevalence of death thoughts, suicide ideation and behaviours in an elderly population

Background Suicidality is constituted by all those phenomena that are apparently positioned along a continuum, with the two extremes represented by death wishes and completed suicide. Objectives The aim of this paper is to show the one‐year prevalence of the phenomena constituting this possible cont...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:International journal of geriatric psychiatry 2002-09, Vol.17 (9), p.842-846
Main Authors: Scocco, P., De Leo, D.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Aged
attempted suicide
Attitude to Death
Biological and medical sciences
elderly
epidemiological survey
Geriatrics
Humans
Medical sciences
Mental Disorders - diagnosis
Mental Disorders - epidemiology
Mental Disorders - psychology
Northern Italy
Prevalence
Prevention and actions
Psychology. Psychoanalysis. Psychiatry
psychopathology
Psychopathology. Psychiatry
Public health. Hygiene
Public health. Hygiene-occupational medicine
Specific populations (family, woman, child, elderly...)
suicide
suicide ideation
Suicide, Attempted - statistics & numerical data
Thinking
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Summary:Background Suicidality is constituted by all those phenomena that are apparently positioned along a continuum, with the two extremes represented by death wishes and completed suicide. Objectives The aim of this paper is to show the one‐year prevalence of the phenomena constituting this possible continuum in the elderly population (aged 65 years and over) of a northern Italian city and to evaluate the relationship between some of these phenomena with psychological suffering. Method Emotional feelings and suicidal thoughts have been investigated by an epidemiological survey conducted in a central quarter of that city. Data on attempted and completed suicide derived from the data bank of the Padua's WHO Collaborating Centre for Research and Training in Suicide Prevention that monitors these phenomena since 1989. Results and Conclusions Results suggest the existence of some continuity in suicidal phenomena, where prevalence decreases from those of emotional/ideational nature to most extreme behaviour. Subjects presenting with more severe suicidal ideation were those also obtaining highest scores in a number of sub‐scales of the Brief Symptom Inventory. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
ISSN:0885-6230
1099-1166
DOI:10.1002/gps.691